


First Priorities

by Mithen



Category: DCU - Comicverse
Genre: Gen, Secret Identity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-03-28
Updated: 2010-03-28
Packaged: 2017-10-08 09:20:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/75154
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mithen/pseuds/Mithen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jim Gordon is trapped with the most useless cell companion of all time:  playboy Bruce Wayne.</p>
            </blockquote>





	First Priorities

  
Jim Gordon crossed the red and white wires. Sparks jumped. He cursed softly to himself.

"Can I help?" The pleasant tenor behind him was Bruce Wayne's. The two of them were in an abandoned laboratory together, where Mr. Freeze had thrown them after breaking into a party they were both attending.

"Double insurance," he had intoned, "The Police Commissioner and the wealthiest man in town. I'm sure someone would be willing to pay a lot of one--or both--of you." A flickering blue force field had slid into place across the door behind him, trapping them.

Jim didn't look at the playboy, who had spent most of his time complaining that the dampness and cold would ruin his suit. "Not unless you have a degree in electronic engineering I don't know about, Mr. Wayne," he muttered. He was trying to rig something to disrupt the force field from chunks of electronics Freeze had left scattered about.

Wayne was perched on a lab table, idly turning over a bit of machinery in his hands. "Maybe you should just relax, Commissioner. Why work so hard to get out of here and back in harm's way, anyway? The way I see it, we're pretty much safe here."

More sparks. From far off, there were sounds of explosions. Jim ground his teeth and swung to face Wayne, whose eyebrows rose in alarm. "Don't you get _tired_ of that?" Jim gritted.

Wayne looked down at his chunk of electronics. "Of what?"

"Of being _useless_, of having no _purpose._ I'm going to get out of here because I will by God not let some monster terrorize _my city_\--" he thumped his chest angrily, "--while I sit around." He grabbed the hunk of wires and transistors from Wayne's hand and almost threw it across the room. Then he looked at it more closely. "Hey, this could be what I need."

He turned back to his jerry-rigged device. Behind him the other man said very softly. "Maybe I do sometimes." Footsteps behind Jim; the playboy loomed over his shoulder. "Try the blue and the white wires."

Jim shot him a look and Bruce Wayne shrugged. "They're my polo uniform's colors."

Jim crossed the blue and white wires and the force field sputtered briefly. Jim hissed triumph between his teeth and looked up to catch the end of a fierce smile on the other man's face. He moved the device closer to the field, put it on the floor; Wayne moved to stand next to him. "It'll only work once, and only one of us can get through. There'll still be guards to deal with, too. It'll be dangerous. One of us goes, one of us stays here where it's relatively safe."

Wayne's face was unreadable. "It seems like an obvious choice, then, Commissioner."

"It does, doesn't it." Jim Gordon reached down and activated the device--and then with a sudden quick motion pushed Bruce Wayne beyond the force field. The field snapped back into place and the device burned out with a puff of acrid smoke.

Jim looked through the blue light into Bruce's face, shocked out of its playboy blankness. "Get out of here! Help our city!" he yelled through the field, shooing him away.

For just a moment the mask fell away. Then Bruce nodded once and disappeared into the shadows.

Jim Gordon sat down on one of the tables. Eventually, he knew, Batman was going to show up here and get him out. He probably wouldn't ask Jim why he had let that worthless ne'er-do-well Wayne go instead of himself. They both knew the answer.

_Beyond secrets, beyond lies, beyond pride, Gotham always comes first._

  



End file.
